Madonna says the success of the Oscar-winning "The King's Speech" gives audiences a point of reference for her new film, "W.E."

Madonna's sophmore directorial effort tells the story of Wallis Simpson, the two-time American divorcee for whom Britain's King Edward XVI abdicated his throne in 1936. It makes its world premiere out of competition Thursday at the Venice Film Festival.

Greek police say they have recovered a painting by Flemish master Pieter Paul Rubens which had been stolen from a museum in Belgium in 2001. Two people have been arrested.

Police spokesman Panagiotis Papapetropoulos says the painting had been certified by experts from the Culture Ministry as being genuine. He did not have the name of the painting, which was being guarded by police in Athens.

Iranian publishers are complaining that cost-saving plans to print Qurans in China are yielding embarrassing results: A slew of typos.

The head of Iran's Quran oversight office says some of the Chinese-printed versions of Islam's holy book are littered with spelling errors.

The bachelor president of the Philippines is lamenting that his love life is like Coke — it's gone from regular to zero.

Fifty-one-year-old President Benigno Aquino III poked fun at himself while addressing members of the Philippine community in Beijing during his state visit to China. Like a standup comedian, he opened up by broaching one of the most mundane questions people often ask him.

The tooth fairy in disguise? No, just a simple tooth thief.

A man dressed in a black leather hat and a dark coat on Wednesday ran off with an eight-foot (2.5 meter) whale tooth from a museum in the Norwegian city Stavanger.

South Korea's first 2014 World Cup qualification match against Lebanon on Friday will be an opportunity for the team to put behind it a painful few months.

Korea's last game was a comprehensive 3-0 defeat at the home of bitter rival Japan on August 10, prompting the first real criticism of coach Cho Kwang-rae from the domestic media since he took the job a year earlier.

Archeologists say they have located and excavated the ruins of a massive amphitheater used to train gladiators east of Vienna in what they call a "sensational discovery."

They say that the ruins located through ground radar measurements rival the Colosseum and the Ludus Magnus in Rome in their structure. The Ludus Magnus is the largest of the gladiatorial arenas in the Italian capital, while the Colosseum is the largest amphitheater ever built in the Roman Empire.

Oil prices hovered near $89 a barrel Wednesday in Asia after a report showed U.S. crude supplies unexpectedly jumped last week, a sign demand may be weakening.

Benchmark oil for October delivery was up 14 cents to $89.04 at late afternoon Singapore time in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude rose $1.63 to settle at $88.90 on Tuesday.

Juventus has acquired Netherlands winger Eljero Elia from Hamburger SV for €9 million ($13 million) in one of the biggest moves on the final day of the transfer market in Italy.

Juventus says Wednesday that Elia's price could rise to €10 million ($14.4 million) depending on bonuses, adding that it has signed the player to a four-year contract.

Inflation in the 17 euro countries remained steady at 2.5 percent in August, adding to expectations the European Central Bank will hold off from raising interest rates — and may even consider cutting them — as economic growth slows.

Wednesday's figure is still above the ECB's target of just below 2 percent, but underlines that prices in the eurozone are not rising as quickly as earlier in the year. In June, inflation was 2.7 percent.